she used to call me bourgeois boy
by runforthebus
Summary: when you're living in the shittiest part of new york, you shouldn't be surprised when a beautiful woman barges in through your apartment window. (modern e/e au)


I remember the color red. And I remember that it hurt. But at that moment, I remembered how the East Village was the most stunning when it rained. Especially at night.

The entire neighborhood of wandering artists would be covered in a dark mist of water and recklessness. You couldn't tell whether it was the mist or the smoke of your neighbor's cheap cigars floating above your ditzy head. The sky's spectrum between black and an even murkier black would contrast fascinatingly with the flashy lights of the buildings reflected against slippery pavements. The world from behind the grime-covered windows of my apartment was made of glass and vapor, and something about the dreariness of New York in the rain was poetic and deep all on its own.

If you don't take into account the inhabitants of this Bohemian neighborhood, that is.

But yeah, the East Village was a painting in the rain.

The year was 1992, and it was raining.

It took about half an hour, but I was finally finished with fixing the leak of my kitchen sink. It was a regular day for me. Wake up at half past nine, check the answering machine, make breakfast while mother's incessant rebuke and pleas to come back and play perfect son to an uncaring family played in the background, shower, go to the university, come back home to an empty and lackluster apartment; the likes of such.

I know. It sounds dull. But I was used to it.

The evening sky was starless yet again, and I was just about to put my newly fixed sink into use when there was a sharp tapping from outside my window. Mistakenly, I made my way towards the door where I thought the noise was coming from, but the closer I got to the door, the volume of the tapping increased. With rusty hands and curiosity, I went to open the window and immediately a young woman stepped inside, her mud-covered boots landing ungracefully before me with a loud thud.

"I'm sorry, who are you?" I asked, alarmed and insulted at the audacity this woman displayed.

She was dripping on my creaky floorboards and was getting mud all over the windowsill. It didn't help that she started to ring the water out of her long dark brown hair and onto the growing puddle that surrounded her.

With a shake of her hair and the shedding of her jacket, she waved her hand sheepishly in greeting, "I'm sorry for barging in. I kinda locked myself out again. I live right above you, actually."

"Why'd you climb up the fire escape? If you insist on barging in, you could've at least barged in through the door."

She shrugged, "Didn't want to get the stairs all wet and slippery."

I guess I understood her reason.

I've never seen this woman before. Her face was new to me. She was half-draped in the neon lights of the city outside, but I could tell her olive-toned skin spoke of stories of a hard-lived past. Even in the dark, the freckles peppering the skin of her nose were prominent. She had a small smile playing on the corners of her chapped lips, cheeks flushed and glossy from the rain.

She was, all together, average and plain.

However, the woman's eyes told a different story. Droplets of rain clung securely to the long lashes of her eyes-no wait, was it rain water? I couldn't really tell in the dark. But either way, it reflected her unreadable and indifferent amber eyes, which promised well-hidden secrets and a glorious laugh.

Her face was the kind that I would remember, but I didn't because I've never seen it before.

"Are you new here?"

"Yes. I just moved in a week ago."

I frowned. "A week? How come I never saw you?"

"Dunno. Thanks for letting me in, though." She gave a dimpled smile before trudging to the kitchen and plopping down on the counter by the sink. "Mind if I stay here for a while? At least until the rain stops?"

She was shivering. I agreed.

"So what brings you here?" she suddenly asked, breaking through the silence that was bordering on awkward, "Are you a musician?"

"No," I stood opposite her, leaning on the back of the stain-covered couch, "I'm studying law."

"In the East Village? At NYU?"

"I'm trying to make it on my own."

Eyebrows raised incredulously and with mock-laughter lacing her voice, she stated, "By studying law in the East Village." I blinked as she laughed, "You sound like a prude."

I rolled my eyes.

"We all have our own reasons. What are yours?"

"If you must know, bourgeois boy, I'm adopting a Bohemian lifestyle."

"And why did you choose here to do so?"

She looked around my apartment appraisingly before replying with: "Well, you do have a coffee maker."

And it was when she made me laugh that I knew I was hooked.

Since that rainy evening inside the quiet and warmth of my apartment, I had been coincidentally seeing her face every so often at random intervals of the day. The fire escape, my front door, the stairs outside my apartment, the grocer's, and that one time at the diner around the corner. And every single time we met, I was always surprised at the impulsive new ideas that appeared out of the woodwork of her mind.

 _("We should start a revolution!" "What?" "Yeah! I mean, it can't be that hard. You just gotta get a bunch of people together, be really angry about something, and be really loud about it. We have the people, it's easy to make them angry- I mean come on the East Village is practically cramped with angry people-, and we're all pretty loud. At least, I am. You're a stick in the mud." "You think you're so cute- don't stick your tongue out, it's childish. And why exactly do you want to start a revolution?" "I don't know. It would be cool to make a name for yourself, you know?")_

I no longer saw her as the average and plain woman that was messing up my apartment floor.

She was different from what I was used to. She was confusing and capricious, always seeking the thrill and adventure in life. She craved for the butterflies in her stomach, the nervous excitement that comes with living your life to the fullest. The thrill of life radiated from every pore of her olive skin.

And as for me, I stood vigil by her side, holding her hand whenever she got too close to the edge.

In a neighborhood of starving artists, of criminals, and drugs, we all do what we can to survive.

But I swear that woman had a death wish.

The evening was cold and dark. The dead leaves crunched noisily underneath my feet. On my way home from the university, I heard the familiar sounds of a honking car and a welcome voice attached to it.

"Hey bourgeois boy! Need a lift?"

Turning around, I was met with the hood of her beat-down car with its fading paint job and dented sides. "I'm not a bourgeois boy."

"With that scarf, you sure look like one. Now hop in before you get mugged."

I got inside the car and as soon as the door closed shut, I was pushed back against my seat, my body unused to the speed and severity of the car's movements and turns. I turned my head to the side and saw that the driver's seat was occupied by a woman with fire in her eyes, a manic smile on her red lips, and a laugh so hollowly full.

The world outside was a blur.

Until it became clear again.

"You okay there, bourgeois boy?"

Without the red light's luminous glow, my knuckles were white around the seatbelt. "Are you high or something? You drive like a crazy drunk!"

I was met with silence that was uncommon between the both of us. It was odd. Before anything further could happen, the car moved at warp speed and the fear of losing my life clutched me as hard as my grip around the seatbelt.

We stopped in front of a convenience store- the kind with the illuminant lights that burned your retinas on a dark starless night. Telling me to wait in the car, she ran inside and bought a bottle of vodka and a pack of cigarettes. She wasn't the kind to smoke and drink. Once she was inside the car, she drove off once again with the same speed as she did before.

We made another stop: the east river. She stared blankly at the gravel road ahead of her, hands loose around the wheel. It took a moment for any of us to do anything, but as if snapped back from a daze, she grabbed the vodka and cigarettes from the backseat and marched forward towards the river.

I followed her but paused at my sixth step when she popped the cap of the bottle open and began pouring its poisonous contents into the river. She proceeded to tear open the pack of cigarettes, and one by one threw each roll into river, watching them float away in a river of broken American dreams and alcohol.

Her hair was blowing in the wind. I couldn't see her face.

I had not moved an inch. What was that about? Was that another one of her "living each moment like it was your last" acts? Clueless and confused, I stayed where I stood.

That was until she climbed over the edge and jumped head first into the east river.

Removing my coat and shoes, I jumped in after her without hesitation. The water was bitingly cold, and it took every restraint in me to not swim back and out of the water's piercing hold. As soon as I spotted her dark brown hair, I grabbed her by the waist and brought her back into the land of life and air.

Resting her head softly against the concrete floor, she sputtered out the water from her lungs and opened her eyes in alarm. It was the first time in the many times to come where I saw the disappointed and haunted look in her amber glazed eyes. She began to laugh, a hollow laugh that held nothing but air, before her loud chortles quickly descended into choking sobs. I pulled her close to my chest, encircling her in the comfort and warmth she so clearly needed. Her tears were painful and hot against my soaked torso, and my heart clenched when she achingly whispered: "I tried to save them. He got too drunk and I tried to save them, but he just wouldn't stop hitting. He wouldn't stop. I kept pleading for him to stop. How could he do that to us? I tried to save them. I couldn't."

It took a while but she calmed down, her grip on my shirt loosening with her quieting sobs. She looked at me and the warmth of her eyes was unexpected and new, but it was a welcome change from the restless craving that took full residence there.

"I'm sorry about that."

"It's alright."

And for the first time, the smile that graced her lips reached her eyes.

"Why?" I couldn't help but ask. She hesitated before she spoke.

"Why not? Just felt like it, I suppose."

Her eyes turned emotionless once again.

In the days following what happened in the river, I began to slowly understand. The lines began to distinguish themselves and the once abstract painting leisurely transformed itself into a form of expressionist art.

Every single time we met, I was both captivated and terrified of her.

She worked as a waitress at a café near Avenue C. Her favorite song was Asleep by the Smiths. She dreamed of being an astronaut. She never went to college. She liked to stand outside Warhol's "The Factory" and eat breakfast, saying that breakfast at Tiffany's was too cliché and not very Bohemian-esque. She came from a broken family. She used to have siblings. She doesn't anymore. She was wild. She was broken. She was rash. She was running away.

She was the East Village in the rain. Beautiful, harsh, glowing, diminishing. Mist and vapor all coiled together to create a broken piece of art.

She took advantage of the fact that you only had one life to live. But suddenly, she no longer felt like living it.

I guess her final act of making the most out of life was to get rid of it.

The blade's kiss was soft and pleasing as she traced stars and constellations on her pale arms: Hydra on her right wrist, The Big Dipper on her left, Aquarius on her forearms.

She was made of water and it was in water and blood to where she returned.

And that was the last time I saw her: the ambulance sirens wailing mutely through the frosted windows and her arm hanging limp against the bathtub's edge while it hurt to look at her.

It was cold and white in the city of New York. But in a porcelain bathtub in an apartment in the East Village, it was warm and red.

And that's when I remembered the rain.


End file.
